How Many Days In A Row Will We Wear Tie Dye (or Disney 2009 review): Part 7.1featured

Thanks for the feedback (via both comment and email) and hanging in there with me for this :o) I think it’s best for everyone if I split these up into smaller parts, so we’ll try it out and see how it goes.

And boring obligatory photo thing: these are my pictures, blah blah blah, don’t take them without my permission.

And on with the show!

There was a heavy forecast for rain today. We’d avoided it for the most part the past few days, which is uncharacteristic for Florida in August and I knew we’d get it bad at some point, but when I woke up, the skies were clear and the sun was shining.

But it’s still Florida in August, so after we all woke up and got dressed, I made sure everyone had their ponchos in their bags. I don’t remember if I mentioned it, but we bought some heavy-duty camping ponchos at Wal-Mart before we left for around $5 each. They folded up pretty small so they were easily transportable and we got GREAT usage out of them (you’ll see). You can get ponchos for less than $1, but those are a thin plastic film that are hot and sticky when you wear them. These were actually pretty nice. Ponchos can get pricey in the park, and I can’t tell you how many times it started raining heavily and how many people we saw running around looking for shelter getting soaked. Come prepared. Florida = rain.

So we woke up at what was becoming our normal time: 7:00 am. Which is 6:00 am at home, which is an ungodly hour that I haven’t been awake for at home regularly since I had an early media law class my sophomore year of college. Thank God for coffee!

We took our time getting ready since breakfast was right over the bridge in the Contemporary at Chef Mickey’s. Mom didn’t want to have to come back to the room after breakfast so we packed up our bags and grandma’s chair for our day at Epcot before heading over to the Contemporary.

Here’s the thing: Stephanie, Mom and grandma LOVE Chef Mickey’s. To be pleasant about it, I more than mildly dislike it. The food is subpar, at best, at both breakfast and dinner (though I’ve found breakfast to be the lesser of two evils). A reservation time is never a reservation time because they’re ALWAYS running late, which invariably takes time out of our park time. The character interaction is nice, especially since they always pay special attention to grandma (especially Minnie Mouse…every time! Grandma eats it up), but with the characters come the headaches from overstimulated children who aren’t being watched or handled by their parents and run over to the characters at tables that aren’t their own and the kids who scream bloody murder when the character approaches, but the parents keep trying to hand Junior off to Mickey for a photo op . Goofy will get to your table. There’s no need to run over to someone else’s table and grab onto his leg to try to lead him away. It’s not cute. And Minnie Mouse? She doesn’t have the time for a six-minute photo session with your junior princess so you can get the perfect shot. Unfortunately, Minnie Mouse also doesn’t have the voice to tell you this and when she tries to leave, please don’t try to constantly pull on her to bring her back for “one last shot.” Yes, I truly believe that Chef Mickey’s brings out the worst in most people.

Did I mention we’d be dining here twice during our trip? The things I do to make my family happy. I’d better be getting an outside seat on Test Track out of this.

So we had an 8:10 am reservation. We left our room just after 8:00 am. The best thing I can say about this breakfast was that it required no transportation to get to other than the walk across the bridge. Stephanie and I walked over with grandma (well, Stephanie pushed her chair and I walked next to her) and we had Mom run ahead to check us in.

By the time we caught up with her, she was still in a long line of people trying to get walkups. Maybe places like Chef Mickey’s, Le Cellier, ‘Ohana and Cinderella’s Royal Table should put up a sign saying “No Walkups” to save everyone some time (we actually suggested it at Le Cellier later in the week and the hostess told us they used to have a podium outside so they could save people the time of going into the restaurant to check, but for whatever reason, they took it away) because walkups are few and far between, especially at those restaurants. I’m frankly sure not what’s more rare: winning a night in the Dream Suite or getting a walkup reservation at Le Cellier or Chef Mickey’s.

Mom finally made her way up to the podium to check us in and got our pager. They pointed us over to the photo stop, but I can’t tell you how many Chef Mickey’s photo packages we have in a box somewhere in our house. At least three. We didn’t need another, so we politely declined. I think we had a 10-minute or so wait before our pager started buzzing and we were seated.

I swear, I thought we were in a jump house because there were kids running and jumping around everywhere and exercising their vocal cords.

I needed caffeine, stat!

Luckily for me, a carafe of coffee was waiting for us at the table. It was that crappy Disney coffee, but caffeine is caffeine and I needed my fix of the hot tang to soothe my nerves. The family settled in and waited for the server to come introduce herself. The buffet area looked empty and I took my chance to go take pictures of some of the food.

When I got back to the table, a glass of pulpy orange juice was waiting for me. Yech! There’s only one orange juice for me: Minute Maid Low-Acid Pulp-Free Orange Juice and this substance in a glass wasn’t it. Everyone knew that I wouldn’t touch the stuff (especially since Stephanie, who wants mega pulp OJ, and I used to fight over what OJ to put on the grocery list until Mom started getting us two different cartons every week) so I don’t know why they didn’t refuse on my part, but it sat untouched and I stuck with my coffee.

If you’re going to Chef Mickey’s for anything other than convenience (if you’re staying at the Contemporary or the BLT) or character interaction, don’t. The food isn’t that good. There are a lot of options with varied standard fare (eggs, breakfast meats, pancakes, waffles, corned beef hash, blintzes, etc), but since Chef Mickey’s serves a high customer load, quality suffers for many of the non-premade items (because you can’t mess up frozen Mickey waffles). The eggs were always too runny or too firm and lacked flavoring. The bacon was limp moreso than crisp. The blintzes were bland. And that’s the thing that I think takes away from the food the most: when you’re preparing food for hundreds of people at a time, since people have different tastes, it’s easiest to make things as bland as possible to not offend any one person’s tastes and let them season themselves. There’s only so much table salt and pepper can do, though.

Stephanie and Mom started with lox and fruit, while grandma started with lox and some blintzes. I started with a bagel and some fruit since I’m pretty sure I’m the only Jew who won’t touch lox (amongst all other varieties of seafood). The fruit was either overripe and mushy or under-ripened and hard and bitter. The grapes were okay, though. They all liked the lox. I’ll take their words for it. Grandma thought the blintzes were okay. They weren’t anywhere near as good as we get them at home (or even as she makes them, which is the ultimate best), but the cherry sauce on the side made them much more palatable.

I don’t remember what anyone else at after that, but I had some of the more standard fare and it was just okay. The sausage was good, but not as good as the sausage they serve at ‘Ohana or Kona Cafe. The eggs were flavorless and too firm. The challah french toast was limp, but otherwise very good. Getting good bacon required standing there and inspecting the bacon bowl and picking out the good pieces, which were only semi crispy. The breakfast potatoes were greasy and over-seasoned (quite possibly the only food item served at Chef Mickey’s that is over-seasoned as opposed to being totally unseasoned). On the plus side, though, there were Krispy Kreme doughnuts, which make any crappy coffee taste good, and the pancakes were fresh off the griddle and tasty.

Grandma and I took care of the entire carafe of coffee and started another when the characters started coming around. Even though I’m an adult and I know the truth behind the characters, I still find a bit of Disney whimsey when they come over to our table. You know how most little girls have a Disney princess they’d like to be? Stephanie wanted to be Ariel? Me? No princesses for me. I wanted to be Minnie Mouse. What can I say? I’m partial to polka dots.

As much as I dislike almost everything about the Chef Mickey’s experience, it’s worth it to me because of how much grandma enjoys it. She gets a real kick out of the character interaction. Probably because of all of the attention the characters give her. Stephanie didn’t want to take any pictures with the characters and Mom followed her, so it was up to me and grandma to have all of the fun.

The best thing, perhaps, about Chef Mickey’s is that it’s a self-paced meal. We were out of there and on our way to Epcot in about an hour, which isn’t much longer than a counter-service meal would take.

Our server brought the cheque ($106.46 pre-gratuity, or four meal credits) and we paid it and made our way over to the monorail to start the rest of our day.